Goodbye to a monument.

With immense love and respect for Coach Mai Duc Chung, perhaps we should wish for him to bid farewell to the national team not now, but at some point in the near future, next year for example, or the year after that, even though everyone knows he is over seventy years old. As Coach Mai Duc Chung has shared several times in the past, he has spent more time in hotels, training grounds, and stadiums than at home for many years. The pressure of achieving results and stress have caused his hair to turn gray faster and more extensively. He even once said that he had to use tranquilizers to sleep.

Besides football, coach Mai Duc Chung (second from the left) also has a passion for fishing.

At the 2023 Women's World Cup, the world press focused on a different aspect. They weren't surprised to see coaches in their 70s leading teams, but they were curious about a team participating for the first time and facing so many challenges. And they described Coach Chung exactly as we've seen him: a gentle, enthusiastic man with a charming smile, though sometimes prone to outbursts of anger on the sidelines and in press conferences after his players didn't perform as he intended, as in Vietnam's loss to Portugal.

Looking back at everything he has done for Vietnamese women's football over the years, it's safe to say he is a top-tier coach, a legend in elevating our women's football to unprecedented heights. He led his team to 6 out of 8 SEA Games gold medals, reached the semi-finals of the 2014 Asian Games (ASIAD), won the 2019 AFF Cup, and for the first time, led the team to the Women's World Cup, transforming it into a leading force in Southeast Asia. His entire life has been spent with the best generations of Vietnamese women's football players, and the impact of those victories is immense, prompting fans and perhaps even the Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) to re-evaluate and properly assess the development of women's football; consequently, investing more in women's football, improving its quality, and enhancing the lives of the female players. The World Cup was the pinnacle that Coach Chung and the players reached, and the legacy he leaves behind will put immense pressure on his successor.

A kind-hearted coach

But also very strict

In a conversation with me in Auckland (New Zealand) while the team was competing in the 2023 World Cup, he said his greatest passion outside of football was fishing. His coaching philosophy also revolves around this, as he places talent last among the five elements of life, after "luck," "fate," "feng shui," and "virtue." He said that in his football career, luck accounted for 60%, and football matches are like fishing. There are matches where you sit and fish for a while and a fish bites, but there are also times when you sit all day and catch nothing. Throughout his coaching career, he has "fished" in regional "ponds," continental "lakes," and the "oceans" of the world, accumulating countless victories and the respect of fans, becoming a highly skilled coach who has led Vietnamese women's football to a peak that will not be easily replicated.

Farewell to the icon of Vietnamese football.

Source link: https://thanhnien.vn/tam-biet-mot-tuong-dai-185231102231618176.htm